Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 150:599 (Jul 1993)
Article: Pauline Thought in the History of Interpretation
Author: Don N. Howell, Jr.

BSac 150:599 (Jul 93) p. 303

Pauline Thought in the History of Interpretation

Don N. Howell, Jr.

[Don N. Howell, Jr. is Associate Professor of New Testament Studies, Japan Bible Seminary, Tokyo, Japan.]

For many centuries New Testament scholars have sought to understand and integrate Paul’s theological construct. The terrain has proved to be rugged, the landscape dotted with the failed attempts of interpreters to scale lofty heights. Some suggest the problem lies with Paul, his thought processes being so elastic and polymorphous as to defy integration. Meeks describes the apostle as the Christian Proteus, Homer’s daimon of the sea who could assume any form he chose: “The real Paul is to be found precisely in the dialectic of his apparent inconsistencies.”1 Boers similarly believes any quest for an integrating factor in Pauline thought will end in disappointment: “Thus we end with the paradox that what gives coherence to Paul’s thought is contradiction at its most fundamental level.”2 Even Peter, Paul’s fellow apostle, admitted that the latter’s writings were difficult (2 Pet 3:16).

When the history of Pauline interpretation is studied, however, one gains the strong impression that the fault lies more with the interpreters than with Paul. After surveying the images of Paul reconstructed by scholars over the centuries, from the “orthodox Paul” of the early church fathers to Bultmann’s “existential Paul,” Gasque concludes, “So often the Paul who emerges from a scholar’s study is a Paul created in the scholar’s own image, one limited by the scholar’s own theological or ideological perspective, the issues of his own day.”3 The church historian

BSac 150:599 (Jul 93) p. 304

von Harnack suggested that the history of dogma could be written as “a history of the Pauline reactions in the church, and in doing so would touch on all the turning points of the history.”4 The Book of Romans especially has been a locus of ferment in the history of the church, but, as Godsey has shown,5 the historical context of the interpreters usually elicited a particular Pauline accent rather than careful interaction with the apostle’s intended message.

In surveying the history of the interpretation of Pauline thought four major approaches emerge: the Greek Paul, the Roman Paul, the Jewish Paul, and the Christian Paul. The central issue is, What is the origin of Paul’s religion? What was the dominant influence on his thin...